


White

by autumnsolstice9



Series: Colors [4]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-15
Updated: 2016-12-15
Packaged: 2018-09-08 17:02:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8853121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/autumnsolstice9/pseuds/autumnsolstice9
Summary: Arya longs for white and the comfort it brings.





	

**Author's Note:**

> sorry I haven't posted in forever but I started college and there is so much work and tbh I should be studying for a final right now but whatever!!!!

When Arya looks out the window, she sees the world in white. There is the snow that blankets Winterfell, a white pigeon slowly walking on tower walls, and there in Jon- white in the face as he gets lectured by Catelyn for something that was undoubtedly out of his control.

 

She looks down at her hand clenching the windowsill, knuckles white, and tries to rein in her anger. Even at ten years old, Arya knows that Jon Snow faces a cruel injustice in the world- she has known it since she has had consciousness- and has to hold in her urge to run down to him and defend him from her mother. 

 

The fight is useless and she knows it- she will always choose Jon over anything- and she lets her emotions take over as she hurries down the stairs. By the time she reaches her brother, her mother is gone, but Catelyn’s presence still lingers. Arya can feel it in the anger and guilt that crackles in the air, clouding Jon’s head and leaving him in a world of his own.

 

She takes his hand in hers, and he finally seems to notice her presence. “Don’t listen to her,” Arya quietly pleads, “Please don’t. You’re more Stark than Robb, Bran, or even baby Rickon.”

 

Her brother stands there quietly, the lack of words filling the world in white, before he takes a deep breath. “I wanted to be a knight when I was younger. I wanted to travel the world, going on adventures like in the stories Old Nan tells us, but I don’t have a name or title- who would knight me? Who would want a bastard knight?”

 

“I would want you, always,” Arya tells him in a whisper, hoping he understands what she really means. _I love you as a bastard, I love you as a brother, I love you as the only one who understands me._

 

He must understand her- he always does- because he gives her a smile and musses her hair. “Even if I am not a knight, I’ll rescue you from anything. Give me word, and I’ll be there.” There is a light blush on his cheeks, standing out against his white skin, and Arya feels her heart swell. She knows that logically Robb would rescue her, or any of her other brothers, but the thought isn’t as comforting as Jon being the one to help her. _Robb would rescue me- Jon would free me._

 

She feels bold, as being with Jon usually makes her feel. He lets her be herself, grow into her skin, and he never judges her for it. With Jon, she can do what her heart desires- so the blinding white that blooms in her heart doesn’t seem that important.

 

They stand together for hours, letting the white snow blanket them in a world no one else can enter.

 

***

 

The wolf dreams come and go, sticking out in Arya’s memory like a sore thumb.

 

_I am meant to be No One,_ she tells herself, _but how can I be No One when these dreams keep bringing back Arya Stark?_

 

Each time she wakes, she can feel white disappearing from her skin. During her dreams it creeps around her like ivory growing on a wall, creating white vines that threaten to strangle her. She cannot imagine a world in which there is no white, but it might exist in Braavos.

 

In Braavos there are wild blues and lustrous greens, and all the bloody red in the world, yet there is no white.

 

_I do not even know what white means,_ she thinks, but that doesn’t stop her from coming back to knock on the black and white door each day. 

 

The door is not enough white, the dreams are not enough white--- nothing is ever enough white for Arya Stark. When she is Cat of the Canals she stares out across the sea, looking out at the horizon that turns into nothingness.

 

It’s far enough away that it looks white in the distance, and part of her facelessness slips away and she becomes Arya of House Stark again. She is Arya Underfoot, Arya Horseface, Arry, and most importantly she is Little Sister. It lasts just a moment- but a moment is all she needs to feel her mind latch on to the white in the distance. When it is gone and the spell has been broken, she will let out a sigh, and from it will come the name “Jon Snow”.

 

***

The last time Arya plays a game with the Kindly Man, she speaks in a rainbow of colors.

 

Red, a lie: “A girl will serve the Many Faced God.”

 

Blue, another lie: “A girl has nothing here for her.”

 

White, a blazing truth: “A girl is Arya Stark of Winterfell, and she is going home.”

 

***

When Arya meets Melisandre on the King’s Road, she doesn’t have time to feel anything except for pain as the Red Woman stabs a knife into her gut.

 

Arya does not scream or cry- she rakes her nails against the priestess’s face, cutting into the woman. Then the knife in her stomach is twisted and she falls, her chest heaving.

 

“I hate you!” Arya tells her, her words surprisingly strong despite the blood pouring out of her, “You took Gendry away!”

 

Melisandre’s laugh, like the rest of her, seems laced with evil. “Why, little girl, you are too caught up on this Gendry boy. Why should he matter when I have something better? Who is he to me when I have your precious Jon Snow?”

 

It cuts Arya to the core, and the cackle of Melisandre echoes in the distance, Jon’s name sounding wrong when it comes out of her mouth, so she gets up and begins stumbling through the woods, heading north and back to the one person who will love her unconditionally.

 

She makes it farther than she thought possible, but she still eventually collapses. Her hand is smeared with blood from holding onto her wound, but what shocks her most is how pale-white her skin is.

 

She closes her eyes as the first white snowflake she has seen in years falls from the sky.

 

***

 

Arya does not stumble upon Winterfell like she expected. Instead she wakes inside the castle, her breath coming out as little puffs of smoke.

 

In front of her is Jon, his face as long and serious as she remembered. 

 

“They told me you were dead,” she whispers, “but I didn’t believe them. I couldn’t believe them- I would have gone mad. Then Melisandre said she had you, that you were hers, and I knew you were alive. I knew it I knew it I knew it.”

 

She know she must sound half crazed as she keeps repeating herself, but there are tears rolling down her face and the only one who ever knew what her tears meant is once again with her.

 

There is white blooming in her chest, spreading across her body like a tidal wave. It warms her better than any fire and when Jon looks at her with tears running down his cheeks and breathes her name like a prayer, the white in her erupts.

 

“Jon,” she gasps, their hands intertwining, “I have missed you so much.”

 

“I have missed you as well, Arya,” Jon says between sobs, “Oh, god, how I have missed you.”

 

The kiss he lays on her forehead is chaste, and Arya wishes there were more along with it- whether a series of kisses like she got when she was younger or something else, she isn’t sure- but she revels in how, though they are surrounded by gray and black castle walls, she and Jon can make the room glow white.

 

Weeks later, staring out a window, she watches Winterfell in all its whiteness and feels at peace.

 

When Jon gives her a kiss on the cheek, she feels at home.

**Author's Note:**

> They're in love!!!! I love it!!!!


End file.
